1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to a storage rack for holding and supporting in an off the ground position a wide variety of sports equipment, and more specifically resides in a sports rack that is formed of a cage type structure to provide a light weight but durable and convenient space saving equipment storage device.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A wide variety of devices have been developed for use as sports equipment holders that are highly advantageous for use with recreational facilities or garages associated with residential homes. Preferably, such sports equipment holders are adapted to accommodate many different types of sports equipment such as basketballs, baseballs, baseball gloves, footballs, baseball bats, rackets, etc.
A number of known equipment sports racks are formed with a vertically oriented cylindrically shaped body portion for conveniently serving as a storage device for spherical objects such as basketballs, golf balls or table tennis balls. For example, in U.S. Pat. No. 6,481,595 B1 a ball storage and dispensing device is disclosed that is primarily intended for mounting onto golf carts to store and dispense golf balls. The dispensing device includes a tube shaped body with an open top into which balls may be dropped and a side opening at the bottom from which the balls may be removed.
Another type of golf ball storage device is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,439,424 B1 and includes a tubular shaped body that is provided with a mounting bracket for attaching the device to a support structure. Other somewhat similar-type ball equipment holders are described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,064,823 that provides a cylindrical shaped body for storing a plurality of table tennis balls and U.S. Pat. No. 4,088,251 which discloses a generally L-shaped cylindrically shaped device for the storage of a plurality of tennis balls. The device includes a lower leg portion from which the balls may be dispensed by tipping the device to urge the balls to roll out of a lower end. Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 5,472,189 discloses a table tennis storage and dispensing device with a tubular shaped body for again storing a plurality of table tennis balls. Such device has a lower dispensing end that is sized to be somewhat smaller than the size of the tennis balls, but the body has portions that can be flexed in the direction of force to temporarily widen the bottom opening to allow dispensing of the lower most ball therein.
In addition to the above-described prior art devices, U.S. Pat. No. 5,823,360 discloses a multi-purpose support rack that is adapted for holding sports equipment, beverage containers, clothing, jewelry and other things. Such support rack includes an elongated pole-type support member to which a variety of other types of support structures are attachable. One of the attachable support structures is a cylindrically shaped receptacle that is designed to store a plurality of balls. The receptacle is formed of several spaced apart vertical members that are connected together at their upper and lower ends by a top loop and a bottom loop. To retain the balls in the receptacle, the lower loop has an inside diameter slightly smaller than the diameter of the balls to prevent them from exiting through the lower end of the receptacle.
Although the above described sports equipment support assemblies provide convenient arrangements for storing selected types of sports equipment, none of the disclosed devices are formed of a durable and lightweight cage configuration that can be conveniently mounted on the side of a building wall and is adapted to include a wide variety of sports equipment holders so that many different types of sports equipment can be readily and easily supported thereby.